Résumés en langue française - English summaries
Discovery of books with Flemish bindings from the library of the Antwerp humanist P. Aegidius and the Augsburg bibliophile M. Fugger
Some time ago I happened to discover a book that once belonged to the Antwerp humanist Petrus Aegidius, or Peter Gilles, who as is generally known counted Erasmus and Thomas Morus as intimate friends. When More went to Antwerp he visited Gilles in his house and dedicated his Utopia to him.
The book, now in a German private collection, is a Sillius Italicus, Opus de bello punico secundo..., printed at Florence in 1515. It has on the title page, two 16th century inscriptions, the earlier of which indicating Gilles' ownership in his own bold handwriting: Sum Petri Aegidij.
The volume is bound in a contemporary Flemish binding, brown calf on boards, and originates most probably from a Ghent workshop.
It should be noted that books from Petrus Aegidius' library are extremely rare.
Marcus Fugger (1529-1597), the Augsburg Patrician who was one of the famous bibliophiles of his time, is known to have studied at the university of Louvain in 1546. He had, that year, several books bound by the Louvain binder J.P., most of which were decorated with the Spes-panel. When his library was dispersed, in 1933 at Munich, one of the Spes-panel bindings was bought by the Antwerp collector E. Denie. The volume contained Casparis Contareni, De magistratibus & republica Venetorum... Basel, 1544, together with Donato Giannotii, Libro de la Republica de Vinitiani, Rome 1542. On the inside of the front cover were painted Fugger's arms and in his own handwriting the following note of ownership is stated Marcus Fuggerus 1546 Lovanij, with the initiais of his motto: O(mnium) R(erum) V(icissitudo) E(st).
I saw at that time the book in Mr Denie's library, but after the latter's death, at the end of 1944, his collection was dispersed and I lost sight of the precious volume. Recently however it has turned up and it is now in the Reserve of the University Library at Louvain, back to the very spot where it got bound, four centuries ago.
Luc Indestege.
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